Back in 1997, I was invited by Valentino Kanziani to play at “Morning Grooves”, the Sunday morning at slovenian club Ambasada Gavioli that a the time was one of the best clubs in the world, with clubbers coming every weekend from Austria, Croatia and Italy. For many years to come, after playing Saturday night, me and my blond dreadlocks would jump in my Fiat 127 and drive to Slovenia. What music do you play at an after-hour? I was never going if it wasn’t for djing but I have spent a lot of time in my youth listening to mixtapes recorded at the best Italian after-hours between 88 and 92. It was usually a very different selection from what you would listen during the night from the same DJs, it was much deeper atmospheres often with influences of jazz, ethnic, or even ambient music. The lounge DJ sets didn’t exist yet and things like Cafè Del Mar, LateNightsTales and Hôtel Costes were yet to become a phenomenon, so you could say that the best time to play those records was either the warm-up or the after-hours. Let’s be clear it was still dance music and most of the people came because that’s what they wanted to dance to, but now and then you would also get one fella too high on something begging you to play harder in front of the DJ booth. Alas! Seeing what is played at after-hours nowadays it seems like the latter have prevailed.
During the first few minutes, you can hear the classic consumed tape noise, the record is Loni Clark “Rushing” (Mood ll Swing Dub) and ironically it goes like “I won't slow down, no, can’t can’t slow down!”
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